Hello everyone!
Wow, this week has been a little crazy. Christmas is definitley 100% different here.. for example, its actually on Christmas Eve, and Christmas day they just sleep in and eat tamales. (i'm not being racist, thats really what happens.)
Christmas Eve was really fun. We got permission to be at our mission leaders house for the festivites. From about 4-9:30 we visited a lot of members and made tamales, and ate tamales. Tamales here are WAY different from in the states. I really love the tamales they make for Christmas, i'll definitley be making those when i come home. We visited the family we baptized and brought they little gifts we'd made. WE bought them little notebooks and put pictures of Christ on them, that they could use for scripture study. (i know, SUPER missionary kind of gift). For Pablo, we gave him some of the random things mom put in my birthday package.. for example the whoopie cusion. HE LOVED IT! They had never seen one before! It was really funny to watch him with it.
After eating a million tamales, i was ready to throw up. My stomach was really small from not eating that much the days before from being sick, so I was not prepared to eat that much. We got to Marvins house around 9:30, and they were having a birthday party/christmas party at their house for his sister-in-law. We played sharades, which i LOVE, but its a little hard when your spanish vocab isnt that great. Elder Dalby went up and was acting out his word.. but just pretending to eat. Me, being full of tamales, jokingly shouted out "tamales!" and i was right.. haha.. too easy!
So the "Christmas" (christmas eve) tradition here is to have parties all night, then at midnight blow up the world with fire works (not the pretty 4th of July and new years fireworks we have, just super huge and loud ones). After blowing off fireworks for about 20 minutes, everyone opens their christmas gifts. Little kids, adults, babies, everyone. Then they eat more tamales, and go to bed. We got home at about 1:30.
On Christmas morning, all of Guatmemala was asleep, so we playedm volleyball and basketball as a zone, then i went to call home!! Which was super fun :) We skyped at the house of the senior missionary couple here, then helped them a little bit prepare for christmas dinner for the zone. The dinner was SO GOOD! Traditional American christmas dinner. Turkey, cranberry sauce, salads, mashed potatoes, SO YUMMY!! THe whole zone (minus the elders in my ward) were there, then we playes games, and went to another dinner with some members.
Mom.. you send the weirdest gifts! Thank you for the doggy bags, they will come in handy. AND THANK YOU FOR THE SEES CANDY!!!
On Friday we got to go to the temple!!! It was sooo amazing!! How beautiful is the new!! ksdjfh sdkgdh (props to Becky and Brandi for the great wardrobe! It looks great!)
On Saturday we had a ward talent show, it was so funny. There are a lot of talentded people in my ward. Hermana Nielsen and Elder Hernandez were playing their intruments, so elder dalby and i didnt have anything to do, but wanted to participate, so about an hour before the activity started, we found this midgit dance thing with Marvin, and put together an awesome dance thing.. youtube migit dance so you get what i mean. EVERYONE LOVED IT! It was so funny, when we walked back to our seats they started clapping for us and the next day at church everyone told us it was their favorite act. After the talents and dinner, everyone started dancing. WHY ARENT WE LATINO! They are the cutest! Everyone dances with everyone! 16 year olds go and grab a 45 year old mom and just dance and its not a nig deal to them at all. It was so fun! I was dying to dance when people asked, but obviously i canty.. and i dont know why these letters are slanted!
On Saturday night, at about 1am, i hear "Terry, TERRY!" It was my comp. "what?"
"turn on the lights!"... "ok.."
There was a mouse in our room!! We couldnt find it, so we turned off the lights and went back to bed.. WHen i closed my eyes i heard the mouse dragging something.
"hna. nielsen, do you hear that?"
"yeah, its dragging plastic.."
"crap, my matress has plastic!" (im too paranoid to take off the plastic)
"hna nielsen, im afdraid its going to climb on my bed"
"thats why im tucked in my blankets"
(so i tuck my blankets under me)
"im afraid its going to get on my face!"
"thats why my face is covered too."
(so i cover my face) Then we slept like mummies for the rest of the night, terrified of the mouse that kept making noises at the head of our beds.
Sunday we set traps with oreos on them. They are the sticky traps, which are the rudest mouse traps ever because they just get caught and break their legs and are sitting there sad and alive still. When we came home for lunch the trap was there, but the oreo was gone. (smart little guy) So we tried again. We contemplated pushing our desks together and sleeping there. When we came home after dinner, the oreo was on the ground but the trap was gone! It had moved accross the room with the poor little mouse attached to it. I had my comp take it outside because i felt really bad. Then we spent the next two hours cleaning up mouse poop from off the ground, our beds, everywhere.. and putting legs on the bottom of the beds so we werent on the ground anymore. WHen we lifted the beds up we found a bunch of mold.. that was gross. But now our room is spotless!!
I have 3 families now that say "squishy baby" to their dogs and babies.. im so proud!
Elder Barrus found a vintage Seattle Super Sonics hat at a paca here and gave it to me for christmas!! He got it for about $0.65 in US money #iloveguatemala
Love you all!!
Hermana Terry
